"I think the person that I heard comment on this that I'm
probably in line the most with was (Stanford coach) David Shaw," Flood said. "I
saw comments that David made, something to the effect of, 'You don't go to
college as a job. You got to college, ultimately, to get a job.' I don't see
players as employees. But I do see more that we can do for them. I think some
of the restrictions that have been taken off the occasional meal just recently, I think is a great step in the right direction. Do I think there could be
more of a week-to-week, month-to-month compensation of the players without
being a salary – some type of stipend? I think that would be excellent."

Compensating college athletes has been a hot topic since a
group of Northwestern players started a movement to unionize in the past few
months. The National Labor Relations Board ruled on March 26 that Northwestern
football players qualify as university employees and can unionize.

The team's 76 scholarship players voted
last week on whether or not to form a union. Those ballots have been impounded as
the National Labor Relations Board reviews an appeal filed by Northwestern.

While the unionization battle figures
to be a long, drawn-out process, Flood believes there are simple ways to better
support athletes. He relayed a story from offensive coordinator Ralph Friedgen,
who said he received laundry money while playing football at Maryland in the
late 1960s.

"I don't know if laundry money is the answer," Flood said, "but I say to myself, 'Why did that go away? Why isn't that something that can
help these young people when we don't allow them to work because of all the
obligations they have athletically and academically?' I don't see them as
employees. I don't see that in terms of college football. I hope we don't go in
that direction. But I do think there's more we can do. I think the more we can
do to make the quality of life of our student-athletes better, I don't see a
negative in that."

David Milewski, one of Rutgers' senior leaders, shares his
coach's views. Milewski isn't in favor of paying players. But after tearing his
ACL three times during his college career, Milewski believes in some of the
benefits the Northwestern players are fighting for.

"I think certain things, like medical benefits in the future
make a lot of sense to do so," Milewski said. "For a person like me, I've had a
lot of ACL injuries due to football and then possibly in the future I could
have surgeries due to injuries sustained in college. To have some kind of help
financing that would make a lot of sense. But in terms of actually getting paid, I
don't think so. We get paid tuition. I'm going to graduate without any debt,
where a lot of my peers are graduating with $60-70,000 in debt. You can't be
too greedy."

Full scholarships cover tuition, fees, meals, books and
housing, but the cost of attendance includes other living expenses that she
estimates add up to $2-3,000.

While federal grants can defray some of those costs, Flood
believes schools can do more to help.

"I know some of the young people that we recruit that come
to our program, they don't have a situation where they can get anything above
and beyond that from home," Flood said. "When we recruit a young man from the
state of Florida, and he comes up here, he's going to have certain clothing
needs that he wouldn't necessarily have had he stayed down South and gone to
school. I know some of that (grant) money goes towards that and there's other
ways of helping that situation also. But I think if you go through a school
year, if there's more we can provide to these student-athletes to make their
quality of life better without taking it to an extreme, I don't have a problem
with us moving in that direction. But again, I don't see them as employees and
I hope we don't ever move in that direction."